Rockaway Beach: City Life With Sand and Surf

About a year ago, Luke Forelle left the Marine Corps and Honolulu, where he had been stationed for four years, and returned to New York. A Manhattan native, he was single and working in construction management, living first in a sublet in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, and later in an Upper East Side walk-up with roommates. On trips out to Rockaway Beach, Queens, he felt an energy that reminded him of living in Hawaii, what with the surfers, himself included, and the runners on the boardwalk.

Mr. Forelle, 32, soon moved there full time, closing in March on a semidetached two-family for $480,000 on Beach 98th Street. “I had cash saved up,” he said, “and it just made more sense than renting.” He now has tenants whose rent covers his mortgage.

Mr. Forelle chose Rockaway Beach, he said, because he was “not ready to give up an active lifestyle” like the one he had in Hawaii just because he was back in New York and in his 30s.

The drawback was the commute of more than an hour to his job in Chelsea.

“The commute going into work is not great, but you kind of feel like you’re getting the best of both worlds — you have a city if you want it,” Mr. Forelle said.

Melissa Carrington, 39, an agent at Rockaway Properties, said she had seen an increased interest in the area since it was battered by Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

The Rockaway Beach section of splintered boardwalk and many of the storm-ravaged buildings have since been replaced. Fortified lifeguard stations and sand-retention walls built after the storm are nearing completion. Much of the area is revitalized, though some gutted buildings and empty lots remain.

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222 BEACH 91ST STREET, #3 A three-bedroom three-bath condo, listed at $429,000. (718) 942-5952CreditAaron Zebrook for The New York Times

A variety of people are moving into what was once weather-slapped and storm-rattled housing, Ms. Carrington said.

“It’s a mix,” she said. “Young families priced out of Brooklyn, empty-nesters who are downsizing and selling their houses.”

Born and raised in Rockaway Beach, Mike O’Toole, 28, a lifeguard with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, wanted to get a foothold in the real estate market at a young age. Soon after Hurricane Sandy struck, he bought a five-bedroom two-bath house with a detached two-bedroom two-bath bungalow for far below market, he said, declining to give the price.

Mr. O’Toole rents space to seasonal guests and has two full-time tenants at the property, on Beach 98th Street. He recently bought another home as an investment a few blocks away on Beach 101st Street.

Many small businesses are opening in the area, Mr. O’Toole said. “A lot of them are doing well, and there’s room for more. It couldn’t make me any happier.”

Carl Fraiman, 69, who works as a property manager in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, has lived in Rockaway Beach for much of his life. About 30 years ago, he was living with his wife and three children in a two-bedroom co-op in Park Slope when he decided the neighborhood was unsafe for his family. So they moved back to Rockaway Beach, where he had lived as an adolescent, buying a four-bedroom two-bath house near the beach for about $135,000.

“ It’s a very special place,” he said. “Four-year-olds can ride their bikes around. People look out for each other, know each other, say hello,” Mr. Fraiman said.

He still remembers the first night he went to sleep after moving back: “The only thing I heard was the ocean.”

What You’ll Find

Definitions of the Rockaway Beach neighborhood vary, but one set of boundaries has it running from Beach 86th Street to Beach 99th Street, between Jamaica Bay and the Atlantic Ocean, according to Melissa Carrington of Rockaway Properties.

However, colloquially, the label Rockaway Beach is more loosely applied to surrounding neighborhoods like Neponsit, Belle Harbor, Rockaway Park, Seaside and Arverne.

In Rockaway Beach as narrowly defined, colonials, Cape Cods and Victorians mix with two-families, condominiums and co-ops built alongside bungalows that imbue the neighborhood with a castaway spirit.

Parking is easier than in many city neighborhoods, with uncluttered streets and above- and below-ground parking lots, though alternate-side rules apply.

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231 BEACH 99TH STREET, #3C A three-bedroom two-bath condo, listed at $389,000. (646) 502-9465CreditAaron Zebrook for The New York Times

The neighborhood is a surfer’s paradise and an artists’ retreat — local residents include Patti Smith — many of whom recall the Ramones’ song about hitching “a ride to Rockaway Beach.”

What You’ll Pay

On May 18, a search of Rockaway Beach on StreetEasy.com found listings for 18 condominiums and single-family homes, ranging from $169,000 for a 588-square-foot one-bedroom house to $1.5 million for a 16-bedroom, nine-bath home. No co-ops were listed.

During a six-month period ending May 2, the median sales price of condos was $256,739, compared with $230,201 over the same period in 2015, according to data compiled by Trulia.com.

Rentals of studios and bungalows range between $600 and $1,200 a month, one-bedrooms between $1,200 and $1,500, two-bedrooms between $1,400 and $2,300, and three-bedrooms between $1,700 and $2,400, according to Robin Shapiro, the broker-owner of Robin Shapiro Realty.

What to Do

The local food scene includes Rippers, known for its burgers; the Playland Grill, a local hangout in the Playland Motel; the takeout newcomer Chicks to Go, for Peruvian rotisserie chicken; and Uma’s, which serves Uzbek dishes and where surfers can park their boards in a rack outside.

In February, the city completed rebuilding the 1.5-mile stretch of boardwalk from Beach 73rd Street to Beach 107th Street, revitalizing a barrier between the neighborhood and the Atlantic Ocean that Hurricane Sandy decimated in 2012.

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91-16 SHORE FRONT PARKWAY, #3F A one-bedroom one-bath condo with a terrace, listed at $325,000. (347) 371-0471CreditAaron Zebrook for The New York Times

The city’s only legal surfing beaches are between Beach 67th and Beach 69th Streets and between Beach 87th and Beach 92nd Streets. The New York Surf School gives lessons.

Public School 183 Dr. Richard R. Green, on Beach 79th Street, serves about 600 students in prekindergarten through Grade 8. According to the city’s 2014-2015 School Quality Snapshot, 9 percent of students met state standards in English, compared with 30 percent citywide; 9 percent met standards in math, compared with 35 percent.

The Waterside Children’s Studio School, on Beach 110th Street, serves about 490 students in prekindergarten through Grade 5. There 21 percent of students met standards in English, compared with 30 percent citywide, and 27 percent did in math, compared with 39 percent. In the same building is the Waterside School for Leadership, with Grades 6 through 8.

The Scholars’ Academy on Beach 104th Street is an accelerated college preparatory school with around 1,300 students in Grades 6 through 12. Students are screened for admissions selection. Mean SAT scores for the class of 2014-15 were 588 in math, 560 in reading and 568 in writing.

The Commute

Five rush-hour A trains run direct to Manhattan on weekday mornings from the Beach 90th and Beach 98th Street stations, reaching Midtown in roughly an hour; five trains make the return trip in the afternoon. Otherwise, riders take a shuttle train connecting to the A at Broad Channel.

Buses include the Q22, Q52 and Q53 within Queens, and the QM16 and QM17 express buses to Midtown. Ferry service to Manhattan and Brooklyn is expected to return in 2017, with an estimated travel time of 45 minutes and the price of a subway ride.

The History

In 1901, the L.A. Thompson Amusement Park opened in the area, which was then called Seaside; the park was later renamed Rockaways Playland. It closed after the 1985 season. According to an article in The New York Times, it had an Olympic-size pool and a 300-foot-long, 70-foot-high wooden roller coaster called the Atom Smasher. The park was replaced by housing, but the Beach 98th Street subway station still bears the name Playland.